1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a binder for loose sheets of paper. More particularly, the invention relates to a binder designed to prevent the removal and unauthorized copying of bound documents.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Unauthorized copying of documents is a problem which costs those in the document preparation business great sums of money. For example, stenography services are often used to transcribe legal proceedings, for example, depositions, court room arguments, meetings, etc. In addition to charging for the service of simply transcribing the proceedings, stenography services are also in the business of providing transcripts of the transcribed proceedings. In fact, most stenography services retain the rights to the transcribed materials and require that the customer purchase additional copies from the service.
While such an arrangement allows the stenography services to make additional money, it also helps those involved with the legal proceeding to maintain the integrity of the voluminous records developed during a legal proceeding. Specifically, when copies of transcripts are purchased directly from the stenography service, these copies are certified as true and accurate recordings of the original proceedings. When these transcripts are unbound and copied, papers are often lost and the integrity of the file is destroyed.
Unfortunately, many individuals involved with legal proceedings simply order a single copy of the transcript, copy it, and retain the original copy for court submission purposes. As discussed above, this often leads to inaccuracies and lost integrity of the files relating to the legal action, as well as lost income to the service that created the transcript. The cost for recreating such files greatly surpasses the simple cost of maintaining an integrally bound transcript and purchasing additional copies from the stenography service.
As such, a need exists for a binding system which allows simple binding of loose papers while also ensuring the integrity of the transcript by preventing the unauthorized removal and copying of the bound transcript. The present invention provides such a binding system.